Background

Born and raised in North Wales, Iwan Llewelyn-Jones has firmly established himself as one of the finest pianists of his generation. He studied with Kendall Taylor and Phyllis Sellick before building a close collaboration with the French pianist Cécile Ousset. Iwan is a graduate of the University of Oxford and the Royal College of Music where he won several awards and competitions for both academic and pianistic excellence. Further prizes followed in international piano competitions in Spain, France, Italy and Great Britain.

He has performed at many of the world’s prestigious concert halls including London’s Wigmore Hall and Queen Elizabeth Hall, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Sydney Opera House and Cardiff St David’s Hall. Festival appearances have included Aldeburgh, Swansea and Fishguard Festivals and he has been a featured artist at the North Wales International Festival, Music Fest Aberystwyth, Presteigne Festival and Machynlleth Festival. Iwan is a Steinway Artist.

As a soloist Iwan is particularly renowned for his insightful interpretations of French music. His recordings include a cd of solo French piano works entitled ‘French Portraits’ and of contemporary Welsh solo piano music (‘Welsh Portraits’) which features works composed especially for him by Alun Hoddinott, John Metcalf, Richard Elfyn Jones, Pwyll ap Sion and Sir Karl Jenkins. Iwan’s highly successful solo recording of Welsh song transcriptions, ‘Caneuon heb eiriau’, was released in Spring 2011. A recording of William Mathias’ works for violin and piano with violinist Sarah Trickey (Naxos label) was launched at the Gregynog Festival in June 2011.

Iwan is asked to appear regularly on television and radio and a documentary ‘Iwan and the Piano’ was made for Channel 4 Wales in 2000. He has been the recipient of several awards and honours, including the Sir Geraint Evans Award in recognition of his significant contribution to Welsh music (2005), a Creative Wales Award from the Arts Council of Wales (2007), the Presidency of the Anglesey Music Trust and the Vice-Presidency of the William Mathias Music School. In April/May 2016 Iwan curated and directed the Wales International Piano Festival at Galeri Caernarfon.

In August 2016, following doctoral studies into the pianism of Maurice Ravel at Cardiff University and the Université de Paris-Sorbonne Iwan was awarded a PhD in performance and musicology. He has given several lecture recitals and presented papers on aspects of French pianism at symposia throughout the UK including the City of Light: Paris 1900-1950 International Conference at the Institut français de Londres and at Southampton, Birmingham, Liverpool Hope and Huddersfield Universities. In January 2017 Iwan was appointed to the role of Accompanist and Lecturer in Performance at Bangor University. Within three months he was nominated for the New Teacher of the Year Award and the Award for Welsh Medium Education in the 2017 Bangor University Student Led Teaching Awards.

Teaching

Performance Studies (Solo and Ensemble) - Music BA(Hons) and BMus(Hons) - all years.

Historical performance practices

Technique and Interpretation

Chamber Music Studies

Supervision

Current students: PhD (Performance) and MA supervision in flute, organ and piano performance.